Дэвид Балдаччи - The Escape

The shooter, dressed as a police officer, was behind the enclosed repair site. He had aimed and fired his suppressed pistol through a slit in the curtain. He holstered his weapon, exited out the other side of the work site, and started yelling at people not to panic but to move away from the site of the shooting. Most people obeyed since he was in uniform.

Still, hundreds of people were screaming and fleeing in all directions, abandoning their luggage and trying to get away from the murdered man. Police, guns out, rushed toward him. Union Station was instantly transformed into a nightmare scenario.

Only two people walked calmly out of the station that day.

One was Robert Puller.

The other was the person who had just killed Niles Robinson.

AT SEVEN A.M. the next morning Knox and Puller sat at breakfast in the hotel restaurant. Rays of cheery sunlight were coming through the window facing the street. People walked in and out of the restaurant, and cars motored on their way. It seemed improbable that someone had tried to murder them a few hours ago and only a short distance from here, but improbable or not, it had happened.

She said, “I have to tell you I had trouble going to sleep, at least for the three hours of sack time I had.”

“Why?”

“I shot a man, Puller. Maybe that’s routine for you. Not so much for me.”

“Shooting someone is never routine. At least I hope it never becomes routine.”

“We’re on the same page there. But we must be making some people nervous. That’s progress.”

Puller paused with his cup of tea halfway to his lips. “We’ve covered a lot of ground but we have no answers, Knox. That is not progress. Not in my book.”

“I disagree. We’ve discovered that two people were lying their asses off and got your brother sent to prison wrongly. We figured out – well, you did – that some Croatian snuck a bogey into Fort Leavenworth who was sent there to kill your brother. We’ve accomplished a lot. We really have.”

“But we really don’t have answers yet. Not for the important questions. Namely, who and why?”

She fiddled with her spoon. “Obviously your brother is out there right now trying to figure it all out.”

“You sound like you’ve been giving that some thought.”

“I’ve been giving it a lot of thought, actually.”

“And what do you think?”

“That he’s maybe ahead of us on some things.”

“Why?”

“He’s super smart. He was set up. He was in the intelligence field. And he’s trying to prove his innocence. Lots of motivation there.”

“I’ve started to think that he was the one who saved my butt when those goons snatched me. It’s really the only thing that makes sense.”

Knox looked at him in surprise. “I hadn’t even considered that. But I guess that would make sense. So you might have been a few feet from him that night?”

“I might have been, yeah. As it turned out, it might as well have been a few miles. He’s gone, and I’m no closer to finding him.”

“You were really tight with your brother, weren’t you?”

“For a long time we were all each other had. Our mother was gone and our dad might as well have been.” He nudged a roasted potato on his plate. “That may be one reason I never took the plunge.”

“What? Marriage?”

“Yeah.”

“Why? Afraid you’d be a crappy father?”

“Crappy husband too.”

“I don’t see that, Puller, I really don’t. You’d make a great catch. And a great dad. Teaching your kids right and wrong, how to color in the lines, throw a ball, execute a room breach, fire a sniper rifle, take out four bad guys with a piece of rope and a stick of chewing gum. All good life lessons.”

“You ever think of getting hitched?”

“Actually, I did.”

Puller hiked his eyebrows. “You mean you thought about it?”

“No, Puller, I mean I walked down the aisle, exchanged rings, and got married in front of a licensed preacher.”

“When?”

“Long time ago. We were both eighteen. High school sweethearts. It lasted all of fourteen days. Big friggin’ shock there, right? I mean, we both knew exactly who we were and what we wanted in life at eighteen, right? Well, turns out we were clueless. So we did a bookend. And got it annulled. So there’s no record of it even happening.”

“Did a bookend? What does that mean?”

“That means we were married in Vegas and divorced there, all within the span of two weeks. We returned our rings and signed the necessary papers and went our separate ways. I never even told my parents. They thought I was at a college prep retreat.”

“Why do I not picture that at all? I mean, you marrying at eighteen in a wedding chapel in Sin City?”

“I told you I liked to live my life fast. But the fact is I was a straight-as-an-arrow, straight-A student, three varsity letters, did everything right back then. Never walked off the line my parents laid down for me. I won all the awards, got into all the best schools. Then something snapped and I went psycho right after high school graduation. Like I said, it lasted for two weeks. After that I got back on track. I got a top-notch education at Amherst while also servicing my athletic side, earned a master’s, decided to serve my country on the intelligence side, and the rest, as they say, is history.” She gazed over at him. “You ever do anything like that?”

“No.”

She looked disappointed. “Always by the book, then?”

“I was an Army brat with an officer for a father. The book was all we ever knew. The Army way or nothing.” He said this last part with particular sternness.

“Okay,” she said, taken aback by his tone. “I’ll just call you ‘by-the-book Puller’ from now on.”

“Okay, but what do people call you? ” he said, his tone suddenly harsh.

They stared at each other for a long, uncomfortable moment. “What exactly do you mean by that?” she asked.

“It’s just a question.”

“They call me Veronica Knox. Okay, now let me ask you one. What changed from a few hours ago to now? Because three hours ago things seemed pretty good between us. I shot somebody who was trying to do us harm. But you’re being so cold and distant now I feel like I’m in Alaska instead of North Carolina.”

“You’re just being a little sensitive, I think.”

“No, I’m just someone who wants the truth, Puller. You up to providing it?”

“I’ve never lied to you, Knox. And I never will.”

“I know, you kept pointing out my deficiencies on that score and you were probably right to do so. But I thought by now I had proved to you that I’m on the up-and-up. So, again, what’s changed?”

“I like how you put things. You should think about writing a novel. Or a blog.”

“And you should think about stopping the bullshit and telling me what’s going on.”

Puller started to say something, maybe more than he should. An internal struggle ended with him standing up, checking his watch, and saying, “It’s time for our meeting with Todd Landry.”

She sat there as he walked out of the restaurant. Knox muttered, “Women are supposed to be complicated, not guys!” Then she grabbed her jacket and followed him.

THEY HAD MADE an eight o’clock appointment to meet with Todd Landry, Robert Puller’s former defense counsel. He was at his downtown office in Charlotte, only a short walk from the Ritz.

A secretary led them back to a small conference room in the rear of the office space. As they walked along, Puller took in the blond wood and tasteful artwork and felt his feet sink into the thick carpet. He noted the elaborate layout of cubicles where people looked as busy as bees in a honeycomb as they toiled away on whatever legal conundrum they were confronting.